Quick walk around the Redmond Watershed trails Tuesday morning. I’d attempted to use the online AI infused robot meteorological prognosticators to pick a time least likely to be soggy, but… it rained the whole time. But it’s all good, we were in SoCal for a few days last week and needed the opportunity to grow my webbed toes back, (San Diego is absolutely beautiful this time of year and has a bunch of nice walks/hikes right in town, Cabrillo Natl Monument, Sunset Cliffs, La Jolla, Balboa Park, etc if you ever get the opportunity.) Parking is free and relatively plentiful at either the paved main southern lot or the gravel north lot. Full restrooms were open and functional at the south lot, no facilities at the north lot. Our route was a messy counter clock-wise loop with side trips to frog pond and the big pond in the NW corner of the property for a total of about 5.3 miles and just 410’ gross vertical.
The trails were a bit muddy in a few places from all the rain but are robustly built and well drained. There was a fair bit of brand new blow/weight-of-snow down on several trails from the recent weather - several step overs and duck unders, some of them being fairly large, though nothing completely blocking for walkers (equestrians would be a different matter.) Wildlife included some ducks on the various ponds, (mallard pair, gadwall pair, male ringneck and a female hooded merganser,) lots of early spring forest birds out singing, plus the neat surprise of the day, what I’m pretty sure was a Rough Skinned Newt over by Siler’s Mill pond, (which are quite poisonous so don’t lick them.) A nice little forest walk even in the rain if you are in the area.
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